Moscow Luxury Suburbs: The Richest Inhabitants of Skolkovo on Map

Russiangate tells about lovers of elite real estate in the Moscow suburbs. Spoiler: Russian officials are among them. Sofia Savina finds out who are neighbors of Igor Shuvalov and Roman Abramovich.

Golf with security

There is an old Russian joke that there is no life outside the Moscow Ring Road. Yet, as we found out, there is – and it differs from fussy Moscow, as well as from poor province. This part is the ‘Luxury Russia’.

The nearest Moscow suburbs, Zarechye and Nemchinovo luxury villages are located along the Skolkovo highway. In silence of the pine forests, politicians and elite of the Soviet Union had their rest there. Today, the ‘New Russians’, the richest and the most famous, are playing golf.

In 2010, construction of Skolkovo Innovation Center, the Russian Silicon Valley, was launched next to Zarechye and Nemchinovo villages. Meanwhile, construction of mansions of the Moscow elite in the nearby villages started. Not only its investor, Roman Abramovich, moved closer to the innovation and science city, but Russian leadership as well.

The mansion in Skolkovo was put up for sale for 4.6 billion rubles: five bedrooms, a wine cellar, a gift store, a fireplace room, a cinema, a hammam, a sauna and a font

One willing to have a house with a land plot in Zarechye will have to pay from 200 million rubles to 1 billion rubles; in Skolkovo - up to 4.7 billion rubles. House sellers praise the villages in their ads: picturesque landscapes of the Bakov Forest Park, Meshchersky palace with a park ensemble with ponds, the Setun River. Local cottage settlements are under 24/7 security. All modern conveniences - sports clubs, restaurants, elite kindergarten and gymnasium are available for its inhabitants.

Another honeypot is the fact that the "neighboring facility belongs to the Federal Security Service." Zarechye’s forest next to Skolkovo Moscow school of management really belongs to FSB. Its land area is 173 thousand sq.m. State procurement documents indicate this site as "Zarechye" object belonging to Federal Security Service without specifying any details.

Satellite images show the land plot is full of typical summer cottages surrounded by forest. On the same territory, there is a three-story house of 838 sq.m, also owned by the Federal Security Service.

Ironically, the land plot of the security agency borders with the one belonging to family of the former suspect in theft. The land plot of 20 thousand sq. m belongs to the father of Felix Shamkhalov, a former chairman of the Higher Attestation Commission of the Ministry of Education and Science.

In 2013, he was detained within a criminal case of fraud and later accused of 350 million rubles embezzlement from Vnesheconombank. According to the documents, he sold his land plot in Zarechye to a relative in February 2015. At that time, he was released from house arrest, but was under recognizance not to leave the country. A year later, the court acquitted Shamkhalov in connection with absence of the corpus delict in the case.

Next to the School of Economics there is a residential complex with brand new high-rise buildings. One of the apartments belongs to the former Defense Minister, Anatoly Serdyukov, who now holds a post of the Chairman of the Board of Directors of PJSC Rosvertol. In his declaration, he indicated an apartment of 220 sq.m.

According to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, Serdyukov is a member of the Grunwald Homeowners Association, along with other residents of the neighboring houses. He entered the Association in 2008, while heading the Ministry of Defense. The Grunwald residential complex was built with the help of the Federal Security Service (some of apartments of the complex belong to the department). The Federal Security Service benefits from Serdyukov’s house: in 2015, contract with Grunwald for 8.9 million rubles on landscaping of the complex was made.

Next to Serdyukov’s house, there is an entrance to the territory
belonging to the First Deputy Prime Minister, Igor Shuvalov. The land area of 76 thousand sq. m registered to LLC Zarechye-4, the founders of which are Igor Shuvalov and his wife Olga. Two more sites with a total area of 5.4 thousand sq.m in neighboring Nemchinovo village belong to their eldest daughter Maria Shuvalova.

Senators. the story of a present

On the other side of the district, near the Setun River, a land plot of 4.3 thousand sq.m belongs to former Senator and a member of the Committee on Budget and Financial Markets, Efim Malkin. According to the documents, he became an owner of the land plot and a house no earlier than in June 2017. However, the real date should be back in June 2016, when the house was registered to a relative of the official, Donya Malkina.

A year later, Elina Malkina became an owner of the real estate, and a month later she transferred it to Efim Malkin under a gift agreement. This is the long way the official got his real estate from Estonian businessman Ross Zeev. In 2014, he was engaged in criminal prosecution over bribery of employees of the Investigative Committee of Russia by "unidentified persons."

Extract from the State Register showing how Efim Malkin received the house

The story of the house in Zarechye shows that the former member of the Federation Council and the entrepreneur accused of bribery have more close relations than just commercial. According to the extract from the State Register, the land plot with the house of Malkin's relative was received not for money, but as a compensation "under the loan agreement" in 2006 and a "contract of guarantee" in 2014. During this period, Efim Malkin had been holding his office in the Federation Council from 2002 to 2015.

Not far from this lovely place another Senator Arsen Kanokov lives. He was the Head of the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic until 2013. The land plot Kanokov declared occupies an area of 6.3 thousand sq.m, while the neighboring area of his wife Fatima is of 10.3 sq.m. In 2016, Kanokov did not declare income and property of his spouse for the first time.

His colleague, Senator Oleg Eremeev likes Zarechye as well: he owns a land plot of 3.7 thousand sq.m here.

Another member of the Federation Council, Maxim Kavdzharadze, a representative of the Lipetsk region, has a land plot in Zarechye belonging to his relative. A land plot with a house of 3.2 thousand sq. m is registered to Valentina Safandulu, his ex-wife. Previously, it belonged to Maxim Kavdzharadze.

Summer residents from the capital

Even those responsible for Moscow development prefer having rest in Zarechye. First Deputy Head of the Moscow Mayor Office and the Government of Moscow, Alexander Chernyshov has a land plot of 2.8 thousand sq. m there. In the neighboring Nemchinovo village, first Mayor of Moscow, Gavriil Popov has a real estate. He has been an assistant to Sergei Sobyanin since 2011.

A neighboring house is owned by a confidant
of Vladimir Putin, former head of the Moscow Healthcare Department, Georgy Golukhov. He was appointed to this post in 2012. Two years later he resigned "in connection with obtaining a residence permit in Switzerland" - this fact did not allow him to work as an official. He lost his post, but in July 2014, Golukhov received a land plot of 2.7 thousand sq. m in Nemchinovo.

In addition to a luxury real estate in Zarechye and Nemchinovo, officials get ‘luxury’ neighbors: Russian oligarchs Roman Abramovich, Mikhail Prokhorov and Vladimir Potanin, as well as the richest oil workers and builders are residing there.

Zarechye is not only luxury, but also mysterious place, as some anonyms are registered there. For example, a land plot of 10 thousand sq.m belongs to an "individual", as follows from the State Register Rosreestr instead of the real owner's name. As they say, the fence is high, the trees are thick.